Opener 9 Michael Oatman: A Lifetime of Service and A Mile of Thread

Installation view (detail) of Conservatory, 2005, in Michael Oatman: A Lifetime of Service and a Mile of Thread, Tang Teaching Museum, 2005

Installation view (interior detail) of Conservatory, 2005, in Michael Oatman: A Lifetime of Service and a Mile of Thread, Tang Teaching Museum, 2005

Installation view, Michael Oatman: A Lifetime of Service and a Mile of Thread, Tang Teaching Museum, 2005

Installation view (interior detail) of Iceberg, 2005, in Opener 9: Michael Oatman: A Lifetime of Service and a Mile of Thread, Tang Teaching Museum, 2005

Installation view of Iceberg, 2005, in Opener 9: Michael Oatman: A Lifetime of Service and a Mile of Thread, Tang Teaching Museum, 2005

Installation view, Michael Oatman: A Lifetime of Service and a Mile of Thread, Tang Teaching Museum, 2005

Installation view of Taken: 1 The Photograph, 2 The Confession (traveling version), 2001, in Michael Oatman: A Lifetime of Service and a Mile of Thread, Tang Teaching Museum, 2005

Installation view (interior detail) of Iceberg, 2005, in Michael Oatman: A Lifetime of Service and a Mile of Thread, Tang Teaching Museum, 2005

Installation view of Flying Carpet (Kilim), 2004, in Michael Oatman: A Lifetime of Service and a Mile of Thread, Tang Teaching Museum, 2005

Fusing the roles of librarian, archaeologist, taxonomist and artist, Michael Oatman makes intricately detailed collages and exhaustively researched installations focused on what he calls the “poetic interpretation of documents.” Archives, photographs and records both inspire Oatman’s invented worlds and figure prominently within them. Retrospective in scope, Michael Oatman: A Lifetime of Service and a Mile of Thread included a selection of earlier works alongside pieces exhibited for the first time.

One of the show’s centerpieces is Conservatory, an eighteen-foot-long greenhouse created from approximately 2,500 glass plate negatives of early twentieth-century criminal mug shots. The exhibition also featured Oatman’s epic collages of natural worlds contaminated by human technology and conflict, painstakingly created with images culled from illustrated field guides, manuals, encyclopedias, and children’s books.

This exhibition is organized by Ian Berry, the Tang Museum’s Susan Rabinowitz Malloy ’45 Curator, in collaboration with the artist, Michael Oatman.

The Opener series is made possible with public funds from the New York State Council on the Arts, The Laurie Tisch Sussman Foundation, The Overbrook Foundation, and the Friends of the Tang.

Exhibition Name

Opener 9
Michael Oatman: A Lifetime of Service and A Mile of Thread

Exhibition Type

Opener Series

Solo Exhibitions

Place

Wachenheim Gallery

Dates

Jun 25, 2005 - Sep 11, 2005

Curators

This exhibition is organized by Ian Berry, the Tang Museum’s Susan Rabinowitz Malloy ’45 Curator, in collaboration with the artist, Michael Oatman.

Artists

Michael Oatman

Publisher

Tang

Cover Type

Hardcover

Page Count

Year Published

2006

Past Exhibitions 2005

Opener 9Michael Oatman: A Lifetime of Service and A Mile of Thread